We, the great United States, are at war again. Not against another nation, finally, but an inter-dimensional race known only as "Pigmies". We don't know exactly where they came from, but when they came, war was immediately declared. I, currently Sergeant Felix Realm, am enforced with a few of my peers to serve our nation. Actually, it wasn't really voluntary; we're in a draft, but because we all volunteered together, we were all placed in the same squad. Among my peers who are still alive now, there are Sergeants Jemima Velar and Hector Mortar, and Lieutenants Dawn Erim and Irene. Registration was two months ago, and we have been in continuous battle without sufficient training ever since.
Jemima Velar, Hector Mortar, Dawn Erim, and Irene have been friends of mine for a long time. We all went to school together for years before this war. I never really expected for myself to be a part of a big war. I'm medium height and thin, not even very athletic. I think the only reason I am where I am is because of the fact I am a telekinetic, and the military wants to use my ability to move (or kill) things purely with my thoughts. Jemima has always been my closest friend. She had brownish hair down to her shoulders and was about my height and age. Hector has been my best friend for years. He was just a little bit taller and muscular than I was, making him more of an ideal soldier than me. Dawn was a good friend of mine too, but she was much closer to Hector than Jemima even tolerated her. She was attractive – well built with curly brown hair, however she had a pretty eccentric personality… sometimes a ditz in my opinion. Irene was a good friend of all of us. She had always been more or less of a loner, but was well welcomed into our 'pack'. Little did we know what potential she had, and what a great fighter she was.
Today was our first battle on the front lines that would actually mean something if we would win. Somewhere in central Mexico in the city of Tenéculo, there is an ancient Mayan temple where the Pigmies have infested. That is where we were. I think that there may have been several dozen human officers here, but since the Pigmies have all been hiding, we have been released into scouting groups to investigate for potential hostility. In case there was any, we were to radio and fall back to a building we have nicknamed 'town hall'.
Hector, some other officer, and I were of one party, and I think that we were in some sort of ancient sporting arena. We searched the field staying low, ready to attack in a moment's notice. We were in typical infantry armor: green fatigues and black bulletproof armor with a hard helmet. We were all given an M-16 Automatic rifle as well as a few knives for hand-to-hand combat. We decided that full armor was irrelevant, as military intelligence reports that the Pigmies use blades as a supplement to their sharp nails, which can easily rip through our heavy armor. It has been stated that pretty much any physical contact with a Pigmy would mean instant death. Hector nudged my back. "Look," he whispered pointing to the tops of two pillars in the middle of an ancient sporting field.
Pigmies. Four of those ugly, two-foot, black and white critters from hell on each of the tops of pillars. They appeared to look like small, tailless monkeys. They had a white belly and face placed above a glossy-black fur coat. Their heads were in the shape of a skull with two layers of razor-sharp teeth and glowing yellow eyes. We knew that gunfire would attract more, so we had to maintain silence.
Lucky for all of us, I am telekinetic. Keeping quiet and relatively out of sight from the Pigmies, I held out my gloved hand in hopes of killing them from a distance. "Cover me," I whispered to my two backups. They backed up as I handed them my rifle. I walked up just a little but further, still within the shadows. I needed all of the concentration possible for this to work. I imagined all four of the Pigmies on the nearest pillar as if they were resting in the palm of my hand. Quickly, I clenched my hand into a tight fist. It worked - the four Pigmies on that pillar exploded into blood and shattered bones in a loud squeak. The other Pigmies heard that, freaked out, ran around, and ducked out of my sight, preventing me from doing that to them.
We heard gunfire in the distance. The battle had begun. I picked up my rifle from the dusty ground and led Hector and the other guy to the 'town hall'. We went as fast as we could with our bodies arched as low as possible in the shadows of some nearby buildings. After two minutes of our stealth running we arrived at the 'town hall'. Only Major Hasar, our squad leader, and his two backups were there.
"What's going on?" Hector asked Hasar.
"The Pigmies have been spotted in the hundreds and they're coming here. I have pulled in the rest of our squad," Hasar said as he winced, "this is going to be ugly."
I heard some clatter behind me. Two Pigmy scouts came scampering down some twenty-foot-wide stairs from the upper level of the 'town hall'. By nature, we think, the Pigmies are bipedal, but as the swarm arrived, they were going on all fours. They noticed that we discovered their presence, so they released a loud battle cry shriek, most likely to call for reinforcements. By reflex alone, I pointed the rifle and shot without aiming precisely. With about three shots on rapid-fire, I killed both of them. I was pretty proud of myself. I didn't acknowledge it, because a few seconds later, a few dozen more came from both the primary and secondary stairways. "Aah, crap," I muttered to myself as we prepared for battle.
In the long run, what we got right then was nothing. The six of us officers were shooting at anything under three feet that moved. They were not armed with any weaponry, but with blades and their claws as we expected. As we killed one, another two more came from behind of the upper level pillars. We were definitely outnumbered. Very slowly, their front lines crept towards ours, as their numbers increased by the dozens. We did well, with almost continuous firing, but they slowly started to advance on us. I had an excellent shot on a pack of Pigmies just ten yards away until Lieutenant Erim came running in front of me. "Dawn!" I shouted sharply, "get the hell out of the way!" Not wanting to cause any friendly fire, I stopped to allow her and her backups to re-gather with the rest of the line.
She turned around to shout at us officers firing. Before she finished shouting "Hold your fire," I noticed that our entire squad of fifty was lined up around me. Both Jemima and Irene were on either side of me. The three of us were on the front lines shooting at the hundreds of Pigmies that were advancing on us. The two front lines were about ten yards wide with both sides fighting to their maximum potential. We were the only ones with projectile-based weaponry, but the Pigmies were moving to fast and maneuvering too quickly. We are normally pretty good shots, but they were just overwhelming us. Our front lines were about to merge, so many people behind us began to drop their weapons and prepare for short-range battle. This has always been my dream, being on the front lines of a major battle. As our front lines clashed we went into hand-to-hand battle. Many of us dropped our guns and fought with our fists and blades. I was still more or less in the second or third row, so I still used the rifle, shooting over people's shoulders at the advancing Pigmies.
My rifle ran out of ammo just then, so I kneeled down to reload by taking one of Irene's extra clips on the ground to the right of me. In the ten seconds I was down, five Pigmies came in close. I quickly stood up and continued to fire at our enemies. Not long after I finished, Jemima had to reload also. As she was kneeling down, I aimed at the continuously advancing pack of Pigmies. I kept the trigger pulled to keep continuous fire, but I only killed one. A single Pigmy jumped onto Jemima' back and lunged at me.
Its razor-sharp claws dug into my chest and went for my heart. I felt as its claws dug straight through my thin armor and skin tissue into the bone. It had a look of pure rage as our eyes met. All within the split second of this event, it pushed its claws deeper and deeper into my heart. Jemima dropped her rifle before she finished reloading, and then with expert timing, she turned around quickly and stabbed the Pigmy into it's back, killing it almost instantly. Maybe part of it was still alive, or maybe it was just gravity, but it fell down with its claws still inside my chest, tearing a deep gash into my torso. I fell down to the ground, clutching my chest in some feeble attempt to stop the pain and the gushing blood. I noticed Dawn drop her gun and kneel down to try to help, but I did nothing but clutch my chest with my right hand and spasm with my left, just choking and bleeding to death. Suddenly, all of the yelling and gunfire around me seemed to decrease in volume to nearly a whisper, and my gasping stopped as well as my need to breathe. My hands stopped twitching and everything went dark as the Pigmies continued to advance the troops over my bloody corpse.